Festivus (11 page)
Music
Some Festivus songs, like Festivus parties, are fully realized. Some are mere fragments scrawled in matchbooks and graf-fitied on bathroom stalls. Here is a sampling of all types.
GATHER ‘ROUND THE POLE
Adam Park, the Los Angeles, California-based movie producer who wrote this song, believes it will become the “Jingle Bells” of Festivus.
Gather ‘Round the Pole
Back in eighteen forty-four
The Festivus snail was heard to roar.
That ol’ snail sure caused a fuss.
His roar brought us Festivus.
CHORUS:
Gather ‘round the pole, young wishers.
Gather ‘round to toss your washers.
Gather ‘round the rest of us.
The Time has come for Festivus.
Of Festivus snail they still are talking,
‘Cause Papa Dan one day went walking
Among the hills of old upstate,
Where he found that shell so great.
On the shell was a hieroglyphic
Of a source quite unspecific.
Papa Dan shook to his core.
He blew that shell and heard its roar.
CHORUS
That roar spread across the land.
Silver poles began to stand,
And the people who’d been abstaining
Opened up and began complaining.
He took it home to little Dan,
Who wanted to be like his old man.
When little Dan heard its mighty roar,
He wrestled his dad right to the floor!
CHORUS
MISS FESTIVUS PROCESSIONAL SONG
A newly crowned queen deserves a song. Here’s one that makes sure Miss Festivus gets what she deserves.
Miss Festivus Processional Song
There she is, Miss Festivus.
She’s relatively un-venemous.
She makes us swoon,
She’s no baboon
She is Miss Festivus!
She’s everything we wish we were.
Some extra flesh, that’s for sure.
But we don’t mind,
We love that behind.
She is Miss Festivus!
Four-eyed one, high school was cruel,
They never saw your inner jewel.
But that was bull.
You’re beautiful,
You are Miss Festivus!
INTERLUDE:
(Here announcer extolls the specific virtues of the newly crowned Miss Festivus. For example:)
She once kissed the drummer for the Lemonheads!
She came very close to doing well on her MCAT!
For some reason she calls pants “trousers”!
For a female, she’s reasonably proficient at barbecue!
(back to verses)
Wear your crown, wield your power,
Complain at will, this is your hour.
We know your end,
A new boyfriend.
You are Miss Festivus!
SO GOOD YOU DO NOT SMELL
Sung to the tune of “Waiting Around to Die” by Townes Van Zandt:
Father Festivus
Please don’t come this year
You used to be so down
With your refusal of fake cheer
And your one cauliflower ear
But Festivus can do without you
Now you lousy clown
We said no tinsel
Is that hard to get?
But you would not be swell
You really are a piece of dirt
So good you do not smell
No
So good you do not smell
Festivus songs around the campfire
FESTIVUS DRINKING SONG
Repeat many times to any tune (“Pop Goes the Weasel” works). Start each round with “carrot cake” and before each new verse the next person in line shouts out a new food item to be sung. If the next person cannot come up with a food item quickly, he or she “loses.” If one of the members of the rest of the group cannot remember the new food item while singing the verse, that person “loses.” Sing faster with each verse.
Festivus we bait you
Festivus we berate you
Old carrot cake in the back of the fridge
We wish we hadn’t a ate you
“BABAGANOUSH!”
Festivus we bait you
Festivus we berate you
Old babaganoush in the back of the fridge
We wish we hadn’t a ate you
“MINIATURE RACLETTE PICKLES!” (making the food item as ridiculous as possible is good strategy)
Festivus we bait you
Festivus we berate you
Old miniature raclette pickles in the back of the fridge
We wish we hadn’t a ate you
(etcetera)
THE FESTIV-US FESTIVAL
The promoter of a showcase of underground music in Edmonton, Alberta, decided Festivus was the perfect name to slap on the event. It started as the working title and stuck, explains Jay Cairns. The homage to the holiday didn’t go as far as acquiring a pole. “We didn’t,” says Cairns, “have the stick or whatever.”
O FESTIVUS!
Joe, a member of the Texas National Guard who asked that his last name not be printed, was at a December 23 Festivus party in Dallas when the beer ran dry. “Not a lot of our girlfriends came,” Joe says. “They thought it was silly the same way women think the Three Stooges is silly as opposed to high art.”
The group headed to a downtown bar called Dick’s Last Resort. “We had heard there was going to be some Festivus-celebrating there,” Joe says.
Boy, was there. “A group of six at a table were belting out this Festivus song to the tune of ‘O Canada!’” Joe says. “No one could give me a coherent answer about who wrote it or when or how.” Ever resourceful, the military man scrawled the lyrics down on a scrap of paper.
“I’ve hummed it in the car, but I haven’t performed it since and I probably won’t until next December 23.”
A disciplined man. Here is what Joe took down. Sing to the tune of “O Canada!”
O Festivus!
Our humble holiday.
Serenity Now is our only goal today.
With glowing hearts we see thy shining pole,
No tinsel there to distract our souls!
From far and wide,
O Festivus, to air grievances we’re free.
Thy feats of strength are glorious to me.
Frank Costanza, we tip our hat to thee.
O Festivus, we’ll pin you first, you’ll see.
Beyond the Festivus Party
Manifestations of Festivus
Festivus lives. It is part of the conversation. Its nothingness has come to mean something.
What is that something? Well, people have started naming cats “Festivus,” if that means anything. Evangelical Christians in North Carolina have tried recruiting the young by calling their Christmas parties Festivus parties. Does that mean anything?
How about the fact that for two years Ben & Jerry’s produced a Festivus flavor of ice cream? Or that someone in Florida installed a Festivus sign next to a nativity scene on the lawn of a government building as a protest? Or that Festivus is the name of a National Football League quarterback’s regimen?
Religion, commerce, sports, politics, pets—it must mean something, right?
THE FESTIVUS HOUSE
It’s Festivus 365 days a year at the Festivus House, a two-story structure with the word permanently mounted across its front, shared by four students at Miami University of Ohio.
As one might imagine, there are hijinx galore.
“One time some raw meat fell out of the freezer,” says resident Tyler Mecham, 21, a senior accounting major. “At the end of the night I was really drunk and picked it up and threw it against the wall as hard as I could and for the whole next day we had hardened raw meat on the wall.”
